In performing cornea surgery or transplants, such as keratolimbal allograft (KLAL), deep lamellar endothelial keratoplasty (DLEK), or penetrating keratoplasty (PKP), at least a portion of the cornea of the donor and the recipient is removed. Generally, a technician or other will use scissors, such as the commonly known castroviejo scissors, to obtain transplant material from a donor. Once the transplant material has been obtained, a surgeon will use a tool often referred to as a “trephine” to remove a damaged region of a recipient's eye and thus prepare an area to receive transplant material from the donor. The surgeon will use a similar trephine device to obtain a portion of the transplant material (sometimes referred to as a “button”). At this point, the surgeon may place the button into the receiving area of the recipient's eye. Once in place, the surgeon may use micro-sutures, biomedical adhesive material, or other means to hold the button.
Due to the delicate nature of the eye and the transplant procedure, the technician must use extreme care in order to obtain the proper amount of transplant material without damaging it. If too deep an incision is made, the vitreous humor may become ruptured, therein collapsing the eye and damaging the potential transplant material.
Previous devices, such as the castroviejo scissors mentioned above, require the technician to make multiple “freehand” cuts in the eye. This often results in uneven cuts and inconsistent amounts of transplant material. These devices do not include provisions for stability of the device, thus further contributing to the inconsistent amounts of transplant material obtained. Also, these devices fail to include reliable provisions for measuring or limiting the depth of the cut. This can result in cutting either too little or too much transplant material. If too little material is cut, the transplant procedure may be ineffective and the transplant material may be ruined. If too much material is cut, the vitreous humor may become ruptured and the transplant material may be damaged, as previously mentioned. The relative unprecise nature of these devices results in increased likelihood of damage to the transplant material and recipient.
Accordingly, the surgical arts have need for a corneal excision device that enables the user to obtain consistent amounts of material in a single cut of the eye. The device should also include provisions to ensure accurate cutting depth. Finally, if the eye socket is too small to place the entire device on the eye, the device should function to score the cutting area of the eye so that the technician, surgeon, or other can have a guide for using scissors or other traditional surgical tools to remove the transplant material.